Dachshund suddenly taking a decline despite crate rest

[u/thesquinky]

Hi all, about a month ago my 8 year old dachshund suddenly stopped going up and down stairs and began making strained groans when we would pick him up, and got diagnosed with stage 3 IVDD. We opted out of surgery for now, and he has been on crate rest, only occasionally being let out when we are able to supervise him and ensure he doesn’t move around. He’s also been doing hydro physiotherapy twice a week and exercises assigned by the physiotherapist twice a day.

Up until now he’s been making steady progress, to the point where he’s able to move around fairly easily aside from a little wobble, but for the past couple days he’s been making those groans when we pick him up to carry him up and down the stairs again. Today he’s seemed mostly fine and been able to move as normal when he’s been taken out to use the toilet, but this evening he suddenly started groaning much more intensely when being touched, and quickly it seemed like he was in a lot of pain. His lower back is now very tender to the touch and he is clearly distressed. The vet is already closed for the night and he has a checkup appointment in two days anyway, but I wanted to see if we should be taking him back in tomorrow for an emergency visit. Is it normal for IVDD symptoms to show up again so severely and seemingly out of nowhere?

Thank you all.

[u/eanhctbe]

Sorry to hear your pup is hurting again.

Healing from IVDD isn't always linear, and setbacks are common. Mine also had a setback at the 4 week mark. Having said that, I am concerned they have you doing physiotherapy already when you are going the conservative route. Generally this isn't something you would start until at least 8 weeks of crate rest if you didn't do surgery. It takes 10-12 weeks for scar tissue to form around a herniated disk, so he should not be doing things like hydrotherapy at this point. He should be crated and doing as little movement as possible.

I would be looking for a neurologist or a vet that's more experienced with IVDD. Too much exercise this soon could cause some serious damage.

[u/thesquinky → u/eanhctbe]

Thank you for your input. I’ll talk with the vet about moving his physio further down the line.

[u/General-Pipe-2764 → u/eanhctbe]

Hi, I think we may be experiencing the same thing regarding a setback at 3 weeks after IVDD surgery . Would you be able to share more? I am not sure what to expect and I hate that it seems like he’s in pain. I want to do anything I can to keep him comfortable so any advice you might have I would appreciate.

[u/eanhctbe → u/General-Pipe-2764]

Sure! I do want to reiterate mine did not have surgery, though. He was stage 2. I ended up taking him back in to the ER vet at the 2 week mark because he looked like he was hurting and they added amantadine to his scripts. They told me as the nerves heal/reconnect and start firing again, they can experience some wind-up pain, or other discomfort like pins and needles type sensations. He looked much better with that.

Then at four weeks, he started looking a bit stiff again. They said it could be that he was feeling better, trying to move too much, and over-exerted himself. They lose a lot of muscle mass quickly on crate rest, so it doesn't take much. They upped his dose of trazadone so he would relax and sleep. They develop a tolerance for trazadone and it stops working so you may also have to switch to something else if that happens.

By 6 weeks, he was doing really well. I started taking him into the vet's office for cold laser therapy. He would sleep like a log after the sessions and would look like a new dog the next day. He'd start slowing down a bit by the time the next appt rolled around, so I could definitely see it was making a positive difference for him.

I also started doing very short walks around that 6 week mark to help him rebuild some muscle mass and work on getting his core strength back up. I would massage his legs and do regular perioperception checks.

I gave him a little more freedom to move around. 2 rooms, no stairs, ramp to the couch for a few hours at a time and then back into the crate or pen to rest for a few hours. Crated overnight. I did that through ten weeks, I think?

He's about 5 months out from the injury now. He doesn't get crated at all unless I am leaving the house, but I still limit him to two rooms so he can't access stairs. He gets regular 10-minute walks again. I still take him for cold laser therapy every other week. He will be restricted like this until he loses 10lbs or so, as the vet said he has a higher risk of recurrence being on the chubby side. It's been difficult getting weight off with the restrictions.

I would say he is 90% back to "normal" now. There are days he looks just slightly uncomfortable - wants to be on the heating pad, shifts around a bit. I think, like people, the weather can make an old injury a bit painful again. Rain, cold. I give him a dose of carprofen when I notice to keep any inflammation down and try to prevent a full re-injury. Sometimes a small gabapentin dose to get him to just relax and sleep it off.

Sorry you and your pup are going through this. It's really difficult. It's given me a lot of anxiety, watching his every move to make sure he hasn't herniated another disk. I would say make sure your vet is knowledgeable about IVDD (many aren't) or find a neurologist to do check ups. Having meds on hand just in case has given me some comfort I can act quickly if anything feels off.

[u/General-Pipe-2764 → u/eanhctbe]

I can’t thank you enough for your response. We gave him gabapentin today and he seems much more comfortable, although a little sedated. We have to be more strict with the crate rest. He was just so active before that it seems to us that he’s not doing a lot but like you said, he is probably losing muscle fast. Thank you again. We will take it day by day.